Uniting
Research and Policy

Rahmatullah Hamraz is an Assistant Director of the International Policy and Development Program. He works with Harris faculty to design and coordinate data collection efforts in Afghanistan, manage and analyze data, and provide research briefs for practitioner audiences. Besides managing International Policy and Development Program budget and operations, he also provides academic advice and resources to students and oversees career development activities.  

Prior to Harris and before the fall of Afghanistan in 2021, Rahmatullah was the Director of Monitoring and Evaluation for Administrative Reforms in the Ashraf Ghani Government. In 2021, he was selected as a Blossom Hill Foundation Fellow to implement his Conflict Affected Girls’ Empowerment Program. More than 300 girls and young women have received education and income generating skills training under his program in Afghanistan. In 2020, Rahmatullah joined his fellow Obama Foundation scholars Mario Mazic, Nelly Wakim Awad, Edem Dorothy Ossai to establish the National Center for Peace and Development (www.ncpdo.org). Rahmatullah has a long experience of working with local communities, marginalized groups and women. During 2013-2018 he worked with the Afghanistan Peace and Reintegration Program (APRP), where his role was to interface with local communities to conduct intergroup dialogue in order to identify the underlying causes of intergroup hostility and armed insurgency within Afghanistan.

In 2018, Rahmatullah was selected as an Obama Foundation Scholar. he holds a master’s degree in International Development and Policy from the University of Chicago, and an MBA from the American University of Afghanistan (AUAF). He completed his undergraduate BA degree in economics, at Panjab University in India.  In 2017, as an MBA student, Rahmatullah designed a project called “Peace-Building through Women Empowerment” which enabled him to win the prestigious Maqsudi Social Entrepreneurship Award at the American University of Afghanistan.